Robert Swift's, The Lady's Dressing Room, certainly does an admirable job describing Lady Celia's grotesque beautification habits, bringing into question the concept of beauty during his era. As we are so far removed from women using Lead makeup and awful smells associated with consecutive weeks of non-bathing, it may be even easier for us to see how disgusting this is, but at the time, Swift was going against the contemporary notions of female beauty, which makes this work all the more impressive.

What makes this poem stick are the vivid descriptions Swift uses of the sight and scent of the less appealing elements used in beautification:
But oh! it turn'd poor Strephon's Bowels/When he beheld and smelt the Towels, as well as
A Paste of Composition rare/Sweat, Dandriff, Powder, Lead and Hair.

As he continues to add these grotesque descriptions of Celia, my main image his initial assessment of her being haughty, or very snobby and egotistical despite what she is subjecting herself (and those around her) to. There is no sense that, as a woman "squeezing a worm out of her nose," she should retract that nose from the perch she's placed it on, high in the air. Instead she seems to be content, even proud of her apperance.

Swift's parody on contemporary beauty is made great not only by the fact that he absolutely pounds his opinion into your head through your senses, but also because it seems as if the atrocious offender has no idea that she could be considered anything other than beautiful.